The Senate objected the US to being bound by the Kyoto Protocol because it did not hold any binding obligations for developing countries, such as China or India. The view was that, even though current and historical emissions were to be attributed mainly to developed countries, the developing countries would quickly catch up, and account for a large share of emissions in the future. In fact, in 2007 China has become the largest yearly emitter of CO2. By 2020, non-”Annex I countries” emissions are expected to overtake those of developed countries (IEA, International Energy Outlook 2013, quoted in Vogler, 41).

→ however, are current total emissions per country a fair way of looking at things? Try to challenge this claim, and propose other ways of looking at the respective responsibilities of countries!

You could say that current total emissions per country are not a fair way of looking at the climate change problem. Over the last century it has been the developed countries that have emitted most of the greenhouse gases. Therefore they have created the problem. It is not fair to say to developing countries that they may not make the same mistake as the developed countries have made to develop their countries and to take their people out of poverty. Over the period of 1850–2011 the US, EU etc. have been the largest emitters of CO2. These countries have benefited from that. This is a reason why you could say that they have created the problem so they have a bigger responsibility to solve it.